Wizards of Waverly Place: Oz
by Thor2000
Summary: Justin has modified one of their existing spells in order to jump into and interact with movie characters, but harper gets more out of it when she gets to star in her most favorite movie of all time.
1. Chapter 1

It was the fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy. It was the length of eight city buses and more than a hundred thousand metric tons in weight, powered by a combination of Corellian plasma technology combined with devices and technology from across the charted systems of the universe. At the helm, Justin Russo analyzed his flight readings with his ship still in hyperspace. It was the Star Wars equivalent of warp speed, a scientific theory that one could travel at the speed of light. By his side was his co-pilot Chewbacca, a tall Sasquatch-like being of great strength and long hair. Beyond the control panel of switches and lights, Justin was excited to be in outer space. Endless night was all around him. The streaks of light were from stars passing by him. He was having the time of his life. Chewbacca turned and roared to him in a language of words created from howls, barks and growls.

"You got it, buddy." Justin stood in the attire and position of Han Solo, the greatest hero and adventurer of the universe. "You watch the helm. I'm checking on our passengers." He rose from the pilot's seat, a laser gun hitched to his belt and his boots tapping along the metal floor of the pit heading to the passenger compartment. With him were an old man schooled in the Force teaching the way to be a Jedi Knight to a young farm boy and two droids, but this was not the movie he loved and enjoyed. It had been altered and adjusted to fit his appearance.

"Luke, why do you keep getting hit by that thing?" Obi-Wan asked his young ward.

"Because it ain't working!" Under the helmet was actually Justin's younger brother trying to be Luke Skywalker. He turned to Justin and tilted the helmet down to look out from under it. "Justin, I don't want to keeping doing this movie. That round little thing keeps shooting me."

"Stop trying to use the Force, Max." Justin rolled his eyes. "Try using your Wizard training."

"Justin!" It was now his sister's chance to complain. She had been cast as the droid, C-3PO. Struggling and fighting to adjust with her robot body, she looked more like a cybernetic person wearing android parts than the droid in the movie. She had her hair and the golden robot body was decidedly female in configuration, but she had the face, arms, torso and legs of the movie character. With this form, she had much of the same stiff movements and limited maneuverability as C-3PO. She rose from her seat and wandered over to her brother. "I don't want to be in this movie anymore. I want out!"

"Alex!" Justin was hurt. "We haven't even got to the Death Star to rescue Harper yet! It's not my fault there's only one female character for you two!"

"Come on, Alex…" Max was enjoying being Luke Skywalker. "I think I'm getting used to handling a light saber." He swung it and accidentally scorched Obi-Wan.

"Ye-ow!!!

"Sorry, Uncle Ben…" Max reacted as the Jedi mentor got upset, took the sword back and switched it off.

"Justin!" Alex's droid head twitched to her brother. "Take us out now!"

"Wait, wait…" Justin had another role in mind for her. "I can give you another role. How about Darth Vader?" Somehow he knew Alex was making a face at him from behind the face of Threepio.

"Oh!" Max had another role in mind. "Make her Chewbacca!"

"I'm getting so even with you for this!!!" Alex was very upset.

"Fine, fine…" Justin dejectedly and upset pulled his wand out from his back pocket and waved it. "Literary Hollywood Terrarium!" They were turned to light and bounced out of the movie on the DVD. This was a new spell Justin had created. Basically just a reweaving of the spell used to jump into books, Justin had adjusted it to enter into movies and TV shows, even to allow him to jump into and replace the characters in the movie plots. Max had got to be Luke Skywalker for a while, and Alex had been hesitantly used as C-3PO. This whole time, Harper had been waiting on the Death Star with the weird hairdo waiting for Justin to rescue her so she could kiss him. As she waited in the Leia wig and hair, she was taken out of the movie and back to the Waverly Place loft in Manhattan where her friends lived. Upon realizing where she was, she caught her breath and looked around.

"What's going on?" She was confused. "You guys didn't rescue me yet!"

"Alex wanted out…" Justin depressingly miffed and wandered to the kitchen to get a drink.

"Why Alex?" Harper looked to Alex.

"I wasn't having any fun!" Alex sighed, rolled her eyes and wandered over to Justin pouring some lemonade from the refrigerator. "Look, Justin, it's a really good spell, but tomorrow night, I get to pick the movie we go into, okay?"

"Okay," Justin reacted fairly. "I guess it's only right."

"Good," Alex was already scheming and planning. "And it's going to be a really good one because I want you to be as uncomfortable in it as I was in that one!"

"Dude!!" Max was standing by his brother. "What did you do?!" They heard the tinkling of keys warning them their parents were home from their date away from them. Justin and Max jumped on the sofa to look as if they were watching TV, and Harper and Alex took to the table to pretend they were studying for school. That was then that their parents entered. Theresa was in a nice casual dress, Jerry in a nice suit and tie back from dinner in a sit-down restaurant. They looked around the room for signs of tomfoolery.

"Hey kids…" Theresa looked round the loft.

"Hi, mom…"

"Hi, Mrs. Russo…"

"Did you kids behave yourselves?" Jerry looked round. Max was heading to the kitchen.

"Oh yeah…"

"Good, good…" Jerry took off his coat to hang by the coat rack by the door. "Well, it's getting late. You better start wrapping it up."

"Okay…."

"Mom…" Alex looked over from the kitchen table. "It's still okay if Harper stays over, right?"

"Of course, honey…" Theresa was wandering through checking the place out carefully. "But the light goes off at twelve."

"Okay…" Alex and Harper pulled together all their schoolbooks, looked at each other with an obvious secret and then hurriedly scurried up the stairs to the third floor like little kids.

"Well, it's late…." Justin stretched and stood up from the sofa. "I'm going to bed too. Good night."

"Night, Justin." Jerry joined Theresa over by the kitchen counter. They looked over to Max in the refrigerator. He had the bucket of left over Cluck Bucket Chicken, a bowl of potato salad and a third of a liter of coke ready to take upstairs. Upon turning, he noticed his parents looking at them.

"Midnight snack..." He claimed then turned to the stairs himself, scampering up them hurriedly to get away from his parents. In the loft, Jerry looked over to his wife, the two of them looking around the deserted living room and dining room.

"What do you think they did?" Theresa asked out loud.

"I don't know…" Jerry confessed. "But I think it's going to be a day or two before we find out!"


	2. Chapter 2

2

By time Sunday Date Night rolled round again, Theresa was anxious to go out and get out of the shop again. When she wasn't dealing with customers in the shop, she was dealing with the kids as a mother. When it wasn't the kids or the shop, it was dealing with the repercussions of having magic in the family. Unlike a lot of people, she had actually met and encountered ghosts, vampires, werewolves – whether that girl Justin dated was a true werewolf was still a matter of debate – and even a few mythologicals. Anyone else in her position might have lost it, but she was proud of the fact that she was holding her. She had a loving husband who was funny, smart and quirky, two sons she was proud of and a daughter… Well, she was sure Alex might someday grow up.

It was Sunday night again. The shop always closed early at five so that Jerry and Theresa could go out. Harper was over again this night, and the kids were pretending to be distracted as they waited for their parents to go. Justin was reading and doing work from his history book, Alex and Harper were watching bits and pieces of TV shows on separate channels and Max was sitting on the floor by the bookcase unstocking and stacking books into a new separate sequence. Jerry walked through and looked upon them suspiciously.

"So…" He looked at them. "What will you kids be doing?"

"Nothing much…"

"Hanging…"

"Watching TV…."

"That's nice…" Theresa looked at them suspiciously as well. "So, Justin, your father and I have a dinner date with Mr. Collins and his wife then catching a movie afterward. Your father left money for you guys to order a pizza."

"Got it…" Justin nodded his head to show he understood. "So, dad, how do you know a guy like Mister Collins?"

"I don't." Jerry spoke as Theresa modified his tie. "Someone told him that I was an expert in witchcraft and magic in the Middle Ages, and he wants to meet me. Truthfully, I'm a little nervous. He's a pretty famous writer."

"His family has a lot of money." Theresa fixed Jerry's tie and looked to Justin. "They own a big house up in Maine called Collinwood. It's going to be so nice to meet regular people without ghosts, vampires and magic in their lives!"

"Yeah…" Jerry looked to her then Justin. "Son, you're in charge, money for a pizza is on the counter and if anything happens, we'll be at the Worsham's for dinner then at the theater. Got it?"

"Got it." Justin stood and rose as he watched his parents depart. Alex and Harper looked up briefly and Max took a moment from color-coordinating the books. Jerry and Theresa were heading out for dinner and a movie. They went out the door, and Justin started counting down from five, four, three, two, one…

"Aha!!!" Jerry suddenly rushed back. "I caught you guys suddenly…" He looked round. Justin was still standing there, Harper and Alex were vegetating on the sofa... Max was thumbing through an old book on the American Old West. Nothing was happening.

"We'll be home by ten…" Jerry looked round, palmed his hair back then hesitantly headed off to dinner with William and Ally Collins. Theresa pulled her wrap over her shoulders, took her husband's arm and escorted him away with a trusting glance to her kids. They were really heading off this time. Even so, Justin waited two whole minutes before reacting.

"Movie adventure night!!!" Justin lit up as everyone jumped to their feet. "Okay, Alex…" Justin and Max feared Alex's choice of a movie to star in. "What torture chamber of a movie are you going to be starring us in?"

"One of my favorites…" Alex pulled it out. "_Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory_!" She was grinning ear-to-ear. Her brothers suddenly calmed and smiled to each other. That was her threat? They thought she might have _Nightmare on Elm Street_ or something. Even Harper was excited!

"What's bad about that?" Justin was eagerly calm about her choice. "I get a golden ticket and win a chocolate factory!"

"Not in my version…" Alex was strolling to the VCR-DVD player. "I hope you like swimming in the chocolate river!" She looked to Justin, paused and turned to Harper. "Harper, here's some gum for the movie… start chewing."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa…" Justin was screaming for a time out. "Not the fat kid, Alex. Not the fat kid!"

"I'm not wearing a dress either!" Max scolded her. He jerked the DVD away from Alex.

"Actually," Alex looked to Max and tried to grab the movie back. "I thought of you as the kid who gets shrunk!"

"Alex…" Even Harper was offended as she posed with the gum. "The gun chewer? She gets turned into a blueberry!"

"We have a lot of much better movies here!" Justin held her choice of movie hostage and checked out the family's movie collection. "Look, Alex, here's a good one: _Mary Poppins_!"

Alex looked at him disgusted.

"I am not singing and dancing!" She refused.

"Here's one…" Max found a good one. "_Van Helsing_!"

"We already did the vampire thing, dude." Justin refused that one. "And it almost killed us." He chucked his father's movie across the loft.

"Hey guys…" Harper was waiting by the TV. "I brought a movie from home." She pulled out a blank plastic DVD cover from her purse, but they didn't hear her. They were too busy running through their family's VHS and DVD collection.

"Hey, _The Goonies_!"

"Pass!" Alex rejected that one too.

"Here's one!" Max had another movie from his father's collection. "_Attack of the Fifty-Foot Woman_!" He and Justin turned and looked to Alex from head to toe. "Pass!!!" They rejected it before Alex could.

"Guys…" Harper couldn't tell if they heard her or not. "I brought a movie from my house. I'm going to load it and speed ahead to the best part." She turned and took her DVD out and placed it into the Russo's DVD player. The others were not listening to her. Alex was rejecting everything Justin and Max were trying to foist on her.

"_The Princess Bride_!" Justin offered.

"I've got bad memories of that one, dude." Max rejected that one and found another. "Hey, how about dad's Benny Hill Compilation set?"

"Pass!" Alex vehemently refused that one. "Look, Justin, you forced me into _Star Wars,_ and now… you're suffering through my choice. Harper, where's the movie?"

"It's in the machine." Harper replied as Alex whipped out her wand.

"Not, the fat kid, Alex! Not the fat kid!!!" Justin was recoiling in shock as he and Max held on to each other. Max was going to be the TV kid. Harper was going to be the gum-chewer, leaving the little heiress to be played by herself. Alex waved her wand and called out Justin's spell.

"Literary Hollywood Terrarium!!!" Alex and the others were turned into light being sucked into the movie, but it was not the movie Alex expected. It was another movie. One that Harper had chosen, and as such, Harper's thoughts decreed who got what roles. As the lights faded away, Harper found herself wearing a blue and white gingham dress. Her long hair was now trussed into pigtails, and she was suddenly standing in a little farmhouse off its foundation. The floor was badly slanting and puttering around her feet was a little terrier. Everything looked like it was in shades of brown as sunlight streamed through the distorted windows of the wrecked parlor. She began grinning ear to ear upon realizing where she was! She had loved this movie since she was a little kid, and now through Alex, she could finally enter it! She picked up the little dog too excited to speak, squeezed him lovingly and hurried from the house with a light hop off the porch.

She was in the middle of a large round swirling courtyard with bricks of red, yellow, blue and green. All around her were beautiful flourishing gardens with large flowers and gigantic trees with a stream flowing under a little bridge into the quaint little village. Interspersed in these gardens and around her were small sized children's houses. Her face about to burst with excitement, her heart pounding like a child on Christmas morning, it was all more beautiful than she thought. It wasn't hot here. If there was a sun, it was hidden by the clouds in the blue and white sky. The horizon looked like a movie backdrop with purple mountains, colorful gardens and a rolling landscape of muffin-shaped hills as far as the eyes could see, but there were subtle signs of the wind blowing the plants and the clouds up high drifting. The land about her had all these round little homes with doors no higher than her waist. There was not a sign of the little denizens, but she could hear them, chattering and squeaking from inside the gardens.

"Alex!" Harper called out. "Justin! Max!!!" They were nowhere near her. Holding her little dog, Harper immediately wanted to go exploring, but then she saw it. It was a large round bubble floating from out of the sky. It glided and bobbed, elegantly flying over the tips of the flowers and houses, coming to rest in a small path before fading away. From within it stepped a beautiful woman with a high crown and long dress of white. She looked at Harper curiously with great intrigue.

"Are you a good witch or a bad witch?" She spoke in a charming and quirky aristocratic voice.

"I'm not a witch at all!" Harper excitedly repeated the lines she had memorized over several years. "I'm Harper Finkle from Waverly Place."

"Oh…" Her acquaintance pointed with her wand to the dog. "Well, is that the witch?"

"No, this is my dog, Toto." Harper was living her favorite movie of all time, _The Wizard of Oz_, based on the book by Frank L. Baum. "I'm just looking for my friends." She turned back to the actress who played Glinda the Good Witch.

"Well, I'm a little muddled." Glinda looked around. "For you see, the Munchkins who live here in this valley have just told me that a very powerful witch just dropped a house on the Wicked Witch of the East. Well, there's the house…" She gestured to the farmhouse. "And there's all that exists of the Witch of the East." Harper looked over a bit more over and saw two feet from under the bedroom window wearing two ruby slippers. From here, Harper knew the entire movie and she was going to go through it scene by scene!

"So, I must ask, are you a good witch?" Glinda looked at her. "Or are you a bad witch?"

"But I'm not a witch…" Harper insisted and ran around coaxing out the Munchkins from their hiding places. "You can come out. You can all come out! I'm not going to hurt you. You're all safe!" She wanted to see them so much!

"Yes, that's right…" Glinda started coaxing them out too. "Come out, come out, from wherever you are, and meet the young lady who fell from a star…" A sort of music filled the land from the flowers, the skies and the ground. Along with this cosmic tune, the little folk known as the Munchkins came from their hiding places.

"Waverly Place she says is the name of that star." They chanted as they came from the gardens, from the houses, from the nooks in the houses, out of the trees, from the openings in the courtyard and the branches of the trees. Their little ones slept in giant flowerbeds in enormous pots. They all looked like little people, but they spoke in high especially embellished voices. There was a few dozen at first, then almost a hundred and they kept pouring further until there was almost a thousand. Their clothes were vaguely Dutch, expressed in vivid colors. No one stood taller than four feet high.

"She brings you good news, for haven't you heard, when she fell out of Waverly Place, a miracle occurred." Glinda added.

"It really was no miracle, what happened was just this…" Harper knew the lines perfectly from her youth. "The wind began to switch, the house to pitch and suddenly the hinges started to unhitch. The witch… to satisfy an itch, went flying on her broomstick looking for a hitch…"

"And ooooo… what happened then was rich!" One of the Munchkins jumped forward to repeat the story to his friend, and another repeated to his friend, and those friends were telling friends. Within moments, they were all chattering and talking in unison the same words building up to a crescendo. Harper loved it all as she held on to Toto. The Munchkins were freed from the witch's tyranny and they started bouncing excitedly, running around singing and dancing and honoring her with dances and decrees and busts of her likeness in the town hall. Glinda stood by enjoying the scene of happiness. Harper then realized what happened next in the movie and looked around nervously. There was a burst of smoke, like a small bomb going off and gray smoke filled the courtyard. The terrified Munchkins dropped and laid on their stomachs in fear, too afraid to get up as a woman with green skin and dark hair arrived. She was dressed entirely in a black turn of the century dress with a wide-brimmed cone hat. She waved a gnarly broom once and twice, looked around once and then advanced on her sister's feet under the house. She was Elmira, the Wicked Witch of the West, and worse than the first Witch. Harper felt like a small child to be before her in person.

"Who killed my sister?" She hissed over the spectacle she saw. "Who killed the Witch of the East?!" She demanded answers from the Munchkins then noticed Harper as a stranger to the land. "Was it you?!!!"

"No, no!!" Harper stood afraid of her, but she was in the presence of Glinda to protect her. "It was an accident!"

"Well, I can cause accidents too!!!"

"Aren't you forgetting the ruby slippers?" Glinda reminded her old rival.

"The slippers, yes!!!" Elmira turned round to collect her sister's shoes, but as she advanced on them, the shoes vanished. Without them, her sister's body started shriveling and wasting away into nothing until they no longer existed.

"They're gone!!!" Elmira screeched and turned back to Glinda. "What did you do to them? Give them back to me, or else I'll..."

"Too late!" Glinda pointed with her wand to Harper's feet. "There they are, and there they'll stay!" Harper gasped and looked down to her toes. She was wearing the shoes! This was her favorite part! She was actually doing it! She was getting to be Dorothy in the greatest movie in all of Hollywood history!

"They're much more comfortable than I thought!" Harper beamed smiling to Glinda.

"You give them back to me!" Elmira looked to Harper with her green eyes angry and venomous. "I'm the only one who understands their power."

"Keep tight inside them." Glinda whispered to Harper. "Their power must be very great if she wants them."

"You stay out of this, Glinda!" Elmira started reaching for Harper. "Give me those shoes or I'll…"

"Rubbish, you have no power here!" Glinda defended Harper. "Be gone before someone drops a house on you!!!" The witch suddenly cowered as if she heard the musical overture intoning her future. She looked to the skies and back sulking away.

"All right…" She crept and cowered away. "I'll bide my time. It's true I can't contend with you here and now as I like, but you better stay out of my way. You just try…" She lifted up her broom. "I'll get you my pretty… and your little dog too!!!" She started laughing with evil intent, smoke exploding from her cape and her body bursting into flame before exploding entirely. Around her, the Munchkins were cowering and crying in fear and once she was gone. Harper felt a pang of relief. There were few dangerous and scary moments in this movie, and this was one of them, and it was thankfully over.

"You can come out now. It's safe…" She called forth the terrified Munchkins. "What a smell of sulphur…" Glinda waved the air away from her face. "But I'm afraid you've made a very bad enemy of the Wicked Witch."

"Yeah…" Harper was eager to get started on her adventure as she set Toto down to the ground. "I guess I better get going if I'm going to see the Wizard in Emerald City. He can send me home, right?"

"Why that's correct!" Glinda was amazed by how much she knew. "You must be a witch after all!"

"Not really…" Harper lit up smiling again. "I just happen to know a few wizards."

"Then Harper…" Glinda started floating away. "You know exactly what to do from here. Just follow the yellow brick road…."

"The yellow brick road…" Harper started looking at her feet for the start of it. When she looked up, Glinda was a bubble of light drifting up into the sky and into the hills and countryside, around the cliffs and ravines and floating off to the North. When Harper turned round, she found the tip of the road at her feet and started flowing it around the spiral of the courtyard.

"I'm following the yellow brick road!!" She cheered excitedly.

"Follow the yellow brick road." The short portly Munchkin mayor pointed her in the right direction.

"Follow the yellow brick road." One of the Munchkins from the Lollypop Guild guided her with his gravely road.

"Follow the yellow brick road." A female Munchkin stepped forward to remind her.

"Follow the yellow brick road." Another male Munchkin spoke in a goofy voice. They were now chanting it over and over to a crescendo pitch building into the song. Harper was skipping and dancing toward the city gates past the old farmhouse and dozens of Munchkins singing and dancing with her to the town limits.

"You're off to see the Wizard… the wonderful Wizard of Oz…" Their high, squeaky helium-filled voices were cheering her way on her adventure.

"Boy, you guys really like to sing and dance!!!" Harper waved her hand to them to say goodbye one last time. The closer she chased after the landscape around her, the more it started to turn into the real thing. It was unfolding and unfurling into the most beautiful valley of hills and countryside and woods she had ever seen and somewhere far before her, she knew Justin, Max and Harper would be around to help her against the Wicked Witch.

At that time, the Witch was exploding from smoke into her castle beyond the Black Forest on Superstition Mountain, but as she reappeared, she was shorter than before, her hat and dark cloak smaller to fit her frame. She was laughing and cackling, rushing toward her tables and shelves of powders and potions. Amidst her cackling, she coughed a bit and started pounding on her chest to catch her breath. Her throat felt raspy. Her voice sounded odd.

"What the heck am I laughing at?" She asked herself. "My hands! My hands are green!!!" She pulled her hat off and unfurled her long dark hair from the bun it was tied up in on her head. Her brown eyes looked and peered around the room as if she was just now discovering it.

"This isn't the chocolate factory!!!" Alex Russo started realizing she was in the wrong movie. "Who am I? Where am I? Why are my hands green?" She started looking for a mirror. She wanted to know if her face was green, but as she reached to her face, she realized her nose was a more pointy than normal and her chin was longer. Just starting to freak out, she began crying at how grotesque she had become. All she had was a brass plate, but it could barely give her a decent reflection. Her face was green too, but she could barely see her own brown eyes. Who was she? What movie was this?

"Justin, I'm going to kill you!!!" She realized she had a wand. It wasn't hers, but it would do. "Literary Hollywood Terrarium!" She chanted. "Literary Hollywood Terrarium!" Nothing was happening. "Justin!!!!" She screamed. "If I'm a vampire again, I'm going to vomit!!!"


	3. Chapter 3

3

After what seemed like a mile or two of open countryside, Harper came across cornfields and hurried ahead to find someone. Toto was doing his business here and there, but at the crossroads, she knew she was going to run into the first of her companions. There was no scarecrow in the field to notice, just acres and acres of cornfield without a house in sight. She turned round looking around.

"Justin?!" She called out. "Alex?! Max!!!"

"Harper?" Justin's voice heard her and he came running on his spindly legs, straw and gay flitting from his body and clothes. Her face was formed from a burlap sack as his head, and his hands were gloves stuck over the ends of his sleeves. There was barely anything holding his chest and abdomen to his lower body. In fact, his feet were nothing more than old boots with the bottoms of his pants tightly wound over them. Without bones, his arms waved and bounced around him. He was just basically animated straw surrounded by clothes, and as he came running, he ran into the fence and stumbled over it, a waft of hay bouncing out of his chest. Harper started laughing at the sight of him. He was just so funny as the Scarecrow, but he just didn't see the humor. He just replaced the hay to his chest and struggled to stand up on his limp feet.

"It's not funny!" Justin moved bouncing and swaying to her. "I am so going to kill Alex!"

"Oh, Justin…" Harper was still smiling and giggling at him. "I think you make a really nice Scarecrow."

"It's not funny, Harper." Justin looked at his fingers waving around as he tried to point at her. "I can't believe Alex picked this move. I mean… _Star Wars_ is a really good movie, and I really tried to include her…"

"Justin…" Harper held back her giggling and laughing to a big grin. "Alex didn't pick this movie, I did!"

"I can't believe…" Justin reacted. "What?" He looked back at her from the center of the yellow brick crossroads. "You picked…"

"Yeah!" Harper was grinning excitedly. "Justin, this is a dream come true! I've always wanted to play Dorothy. I mean…" She moved her basket to her left arm. "When I was in the fourth grade, I wanted to play Dorothy, but Shelia Odom got it instead. I didn't even get to play the Witch. I had to play a Munchkin. A Munchkin, Justin!" She stared at him a moment. "Please don't ruin this for me."

"Well…" Justin tried to stand straight, but he was swaying in the breeze. "Okay…." He rolled his eyes.

"Thank you!" She reached out and hugged him. "Oh, my god, I wonder who Alex is going to be? The Tin-Man or the Cowardly Lion?"

"Alex as the Cowardly Lion?" Justin mugged and thought about it. "Oh my god!!!" He slapped his leg laughing. "I got to see that! I got to see that!!!" He started to run ahead and then came back to get Harper. "Wait! Harper, you already ran into the Witch, wasn't that her?"

"No, actually it wasn't."

"Alex as the cowardly lion!!!!" Justin was laughing hysterically eager and anxious to find her. "Or even better! As the Tin Man! We got to go find her!" He started racing ahead then noticed Harper looked upset. Garbed in that blue gingham dress with her hair in pigtails, she was staring at him and pointing to her side. She wanted him next to her.

"What?" Justin didn't understand what she wanted.

"Justin, I am Dorothy…" Harper took charge. "We are doing this right." She took his hand to lead the way. "We're…" She started singing. "Off to see the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of Oz." Justin was finally singing along with her. "He really is a Wiz of a wiz if ever a wiz there was. If every there was a wonderful wiz, the Wonderful Wizard of Oz is the one because-because-because-because-because-because… the wonderful things he does!" The air twinged with musical notes and Toto running along behind them. "We're off to see the Wizard… the Wonderful Wizard of Oz!!!!" They began following the path down through a shady glen into a nice meadow beyond the cornfields. Their singing voices were emanating from the television into the real world that was the Russo's empty apartment loft above their restaurant. The tinkling of keys sounded as the door was unlocked. A bit disgruntled and annoyed with himself, Jerry Russo entered his home expecting to see his kids watching TV. It was going, but they were not present.

"Jerry," Theresa returned to the loft ahead of her husband. "How could you forget your wallet?"

"I took it out to give the kids money for a pizza." Jerry started across to get his wallet, but Theresa got it first and handed it to him. Jerry took it and noticed the movie on the TV. He had seen the movie a lot himself, and it always took him back to his childhood.

"You know, I've seen this movie over a hundred times," He reminisced nostalgically about it. "I never noticed just how much Judy Garland looked like Harper."

"Jerry…" Theresa was reacting to the likeness.

"Or how much the Scarecrow looked like…" It slowly started sinking in where the kids were. "Justin???"

"Jerry!" Theresa freaked. "That's the kids! They're in the movie!"

"What? Who? How? Why?! Justin!!!" Jerry suddenly broke with anger and raced the set. "Justin, this is your father! I want you out of there, right now!!!"

"Jerry!" Theresa and Jerry stood over the TV and the DVD player. "Get them out of there! Stop the movie or something! Get them out of there!"

"I don't think I should!" Jerry was analyzing what was going on. "If I take the DVD out, I could permanently burn them into it or something, but look…" They looked at the movie in the TV. "They're happy, they don't seem to be in danger, and… we did want to see a movie." He looked to his wife. "We could watch the movie and the kids at the same time…"

"I'll pop the popcorn!" Theresa rushed to get the air popper out.

"I'll order us a pizza!" Jerry took the phone.


	4. Chapter 4

4

Another mile or two down the Yellow Brick Road, Justin bouncing with his straw body and Harper were noticing things in Oz from the Yellow Brick Road not seen in the movie like deserted houses, old stone structures covered and taken over by weeds and brush, a crystal clear waterfall that passed under the Yellow Brick Road into a nice lake and the signs of old castles on distant mountaintops in the distance. They were actually walking the miles of the road instead of skipping ahead to scenes. That meant time had to be compressed here. They could spend days here and return home only an hour after they had left. Eventually, the woods around them dwindled to tree farms and Harper noticed apple trees in the distance. She started to rush to take one, but Justin pulled her back.

"Harper, talking trees?"

"What?" She suddenly realized they were in a movie. "I forgot. I've been having so much fun on our date."

"It's not a date." Justin was looking around. "Let's see… there should be a cabin…" He scouted up a bit up the Yellow Brick Road. "Cabin! And the Tin-Man is right…"

"He's right there!!!" Harper saw him first. Off through the trees, they noticed the Tin Man trapped in mid-pose. With Dorothy's basket daintily over her left arm, she dashed over just ahead of Justin bouncing and scampering lightly toward. The two of them came around to look at who it was in the role of the Tin Man and suddenly started laughing. The body was metal, and the face was silver, but those brown eyes belonged to Max Russo. He was never so glad to see them. He couldn't move! Try as he could, his arms and legs wouldn't move. His fingers wouldn't wiggle, his head wouldn't turn, he couldn't even cry out for help. Without helping him, Justin and Harper began laughing and screaming hysterically. Not only was he funny bald and without hair, but he was much shorter than Jack Haley who had defined the role. Max just moaned pitifully and rolled his eyes at them.

"I'm sorry, Max…" Harper apologized and looked around to find the oilcan. She oiled the corners of his mouth, his neck and down around his arms, shoulders and legs, passing the oil to Justin to get the other side. "Wow, there's a lot of oil in this can!"

"Where have you guys been?" Max started groaning and struggling to move. His whole body was creaking and squeaking at his joints and hinges. "I don't recall this scene in _Willie Wonka_!!"

"We're not in Wonka, Max…" Justin oiled his brother's arms and legs as Harper started forcing Max's arms to move. "Harper picked the movie. We're in _The Wizard Of Oz_."

"They made a movie about our lives?"

"_The Wizard Of Oz_." Harper tried to tell him about it. "You know, Dorothy, ruby shoes, wicked witch, flying monkeys?"

"Never heard of it…"

"Wait a second…" Justin rapped at Max's chest as it echoed from the noise. "It's hollow!" He began laughing again.

"That's so cool!" Max rapped at his own chest. "So, I'm kind of a robot?"

"Yeah, whatever you want to think, Max…" Justin humored his brother.

"Oh my god…" Harper began thinking. "This means Alex is going to be the Cowardly Lion. That is going to be the funniest…"

"Justin!!!!" Alex's voice was screaming from somewhere near them.

"I think she caught up with us." Justin realized and started looking round. Harper looked down and round, and Max creaked and squeaked in his tin body as he looked around. Harper turned round and pointed to the roof of the cabin.

"Look!!!"

"Justin!" Standing on the roof, Alex's green face and long flowing black hair topped the costume of the Wicked Witch of the West. "I'm going to kill you!" She leaned a bit far to her left and stumbled, sliding off the roof, into the woodpile and landing in the soft grass. Justin was surprised at first, but then Harper started laughing and Justin and Max started laughing as well. Alex looked positively hideous with green skin and the big nose and chin. Scrambling to her feet, she picked up the witch's tin wand and marched upset to her brothers and best friend laughing and pointing at her. Hunched over disgusted, Alex started swatting Justin, but when she kicked Max in the tin body, she hurt her foot, making them laugh even more.

"Stop laughing!!!" She ordered them. "Stop laughing!!! Justin, I'm turning you into a campfire!!!" She started to wave her wand.

"Who, whoa, whoa, whoa, who…" Justin stopped her from scorching his straw and hay body. "This isn't my movie. It's Harper's!"

"Harper?!" Alex looked to her best friend as Max kept laughing and pounding his metal chest.

"Yeah!" Harper was so happy. "Oh, Alex, I'm so sorry. I thought you were going to be Glinda, The Good Witch… I don't know what happened!" She looked genuinely sorry. Alex was livid. She was still getting the worst of this. She wandered around Max disgustedly trying to think. She was not playing someone who was ugly. It was either Dorothy or Glinda. No one else!

"Justin…" Alex responded upset and blew her long hair out of her face. "Send me home. I am not playing the witch."

"Does it look like I got a wand in this." He gestured over his straw body and looked at her ugly green face. "I'm not controlling this. This is Harper's movie. She's controlling it."

"Harper?" Alex and Max chorused together and looked to her. For the first time, the girl without the powers was controlling everything.

"Me?" Harper started grinning. "Really? Wow! So I should have a wand right…" She started poking through her basket. She had Dorothy's clothes, a leftover sandwich and biscuits for Toto, but there was no wand in the basket. She leaned to Justin. "Justin, I can't find a wand." She whispered.

"No wand?!" Max started clanking around in a circle. Alex rolled her eyes upset. They were stuck! "You mean we're not getting out of this place?" He paused thinking about it. "This is like so cool!!!" He was clanking around proudly in his metal body. "I can't wait to go to school like this!"

"Calm down!!!" Justin took charge. "Look, I got a back-up charm on the spell for this contingency. If we act out the rest of the movie, we automatically get popped out at the end before the credits. We just got to finish the movie." He turned to his sister with the green face, dark stringy hair, pointed chin, big nose, black clothes and pointed hat with the wide brim and snorted ready to start laughing again. "Alex, go to the Witch's Castle, wait for us and don't forget to kidnap Harper when we leave Emerald City. We have to stick to the plot!"

"Fine!" Alex turned snotty. "You better hope I don't accidentally torch you along the way. God, I suddenly hate this movie!" She pounded the yellow brick road with her broom and erupted into churning smoke and flame. Max was stomping the road where she had vanished looking for where she was, but Harper was ready to continue the movie. She took her place ready to continue.

"Guys…" She looked to Justin and Max. "We still have to catch up with the Cowardly Lion."

"Yeah…" Justin took his place at her right side and Max at her left. Max reacted a bit confused as to why they were holding hands.

"What's she doing?" Max asked Justin.

"Just go along with it..." Justin tried to be happy as Harper lived her fantasy.

"We're…" Harper was once again leading the chorus and happily dragging along Justin and Max clanking along with Toto following along with them. "…Off to see the Wizard… The Wonderful Wizard of Oz!!! He really is a wiz of a wiz if ever a wiz there was…." She forced Justin and Max to sing with her until they were all happily singing and dancing along the way with Toto scampering alongside with them.

"We're off to see the wizard... the wonderful Wizard of Oz..........."


	5. Chapter 5

5

After rushing through meeting the Cowardly Lion and a confusing string of events trying to stay in sequence at Emerald City, Justin, Harper, Max and the Cowardly Lion were taking the road west from the city toward the Superstition Mountains near the border of Oz with Wonderland, Neverland and Narnia. (As according to Justin.) Above the sky of the very green city, Alex forgot to write "Surrender, Dorothy" in the sky; she possibly couldn't spell it either anyway, but they still got to see the Wizard and he did still send them to bring back Alex's broom. Beyond the apple, pear, elm and oak trees of the Western Forest were the pine and fir trees beyond it, but gradually the trees showed signs of sickness and they found more and more trees that were dead and devoid of trees. From the surrounding shadows, eyes peered out from hollows, and moving shadows flitted from sounds off the dirt road. The screeching and terrifying winged moneys came on time, ripping Justin apart by his clothes and knocking Max around. Harper really was scared during the sequence. The monkey carrying her didn't seem to fly very well; nearly dropping her from the sky. Max and the Lion horsed around putting Justin back together, but eventually Justin got together with a few leaves and weeds stuffed into him along with the strewn straw. By time he got together, Toto had escaped the castle to show them the back way, and they were off to rescue Harper and deal with Alex. Halfway up the rocky slope, Max accidentally skewered from the plot.

"That stupid lion was slowing us down anyway." Justin and Max stared down from the rocky ledge of the Witch's Castle. They looked to where the Lion was or more accurately, where he no longer was. One second, Justin was having Max ascending up alongside him, telling him to help the Lion up alongside him, but when he looked back, the lion was scratching and pawing in a panic to stop his sliding then going over the ledge.

"Is this going to affect the movie?" Max's silver face looked to Justin.

"I don't know." Justin and Max were climbing up to a ledge where Toto was waiting. "I think the movie has a way of fixing things we screw up or get wrong." They lifted up over the top and looked down to the courtyard. Down below them, there were about twenty guards in Hessian uniforms with the large British bushy helmets. They were mixing in and out of perfect formation. Justin watched them closely; Toto was by him barking excitedly to get to see Harper again.

"Dude," Max was clanking and squeaking in his hinges. "There is a road over there! Why did we take the hard way?!"

"Quiet, Max…" Justin was watching for the time to slip in. "Now, in the movie, they sneak in wearing the uniforms of the guards… I can't recall how they got them."

"Maybe from the three guys who came up behind them?"

"What three guys?" Justin suddenly remembered then turned round to face three of the biggest guards looking over them with large bladed staffs. "Hey guys!!! You found us!" He looked to Max in the metal body. "This is why we needed the Cowardly Lion!!!" The guards reached to grab them, and Justin started swinging. Max lost his axe and started punching like a Knock-And-Sock 'Em Robot. There was a flurry of activity as they started scrapping, pushing, fighting and kicking down into a bushy ditch, but a few seconds later, only a certain few figures emerged.

"Those guys couldn't find worth a darn!!!" Justin was laughing as he pulled on a guard's coat and hat. "I just kicked mine and he went down!"

"I just flicked one to the nose and punched the other to the chest and they never got up!" Max was laughing as he took a coat and hat from his opponent. Justin handed him a staff and they were hurrying to the castle. The loud rickety drawbridge was raising up to seal them inside, Toto right behind them. Max clanking into the large castle with him, Justin looked up and around bare castle walls and noticed a great hall he recognized. The stairway to his left supposedly lead up to the witch's tower. Up atop on the next floor, Harper was wandering toward the room free and alone. She looked down and noticed Justin and Max.

"Justin! Come on up! We've been waiting for you!" She bent down to get Toto rushing toward her. Alex reappeared hurriedly as the witch eager and in a hurry to get out of the movie.

"What the freaking hell took you idiots?!!" She yelled at her brothers.

"Hey…" Justin was hurrying up to confront her. "It takes a while to climb a cliff."

"Justin…" Harper looked at Justin with Toto in her arms. "There was a road."

"You see, Justin!!!" Max swatted his brother. "I told you there was a road!"

"Enough!!!" Justin looked at Max being difficult then back to Harper as Dorothy. "Now," He cleared his throat. "Harper, are you ready?"

"You, I got it right here while Alex looting the castle." She reached down to a bucket of water by the door of the witch's tower.

"I was not looting the castle!" Alex resented that implication as she reached over and lifted a burlap sack of stuff from the castle. She noticed the bucket of water. "Harper, what are you doing with that?"

"Well, Alex…" Harper looked to Justin and Max. "We're getting ready to end the movie, you know. The witch melts at the end… no disrespect, and I'm really sorry!"

"I'm not letting you melt me!!!" Alex looked to them as if they were crazy.

"Alex, that's how the movie ends if we want to get out!" They were backing her along the upstairs corridor.

"No!" Alex resisted. "The movie ends when we… meaning I with you guys go to Emerald City. That's how we get out!"

"Alex, are you afraid of getting wet?" Max was getting close to his sister.

"No, I just…" Alex looked behind her brothers and Harper. "Hey look, it's Peter Pan!!!" They looked away and she dropped her bag to race down the hall in her long black dress, losing her hat in the process. Justin looked back at her running away.

"After her!!!" They took off after her to catch her. Alex was a bit fleet of foot as Max tried to keep up, but his tin body was slowing him down. Alex raced through a hall looking for an exit. A door, a room, a courtyard and her guards watching her race through. Harper and Justin suddenly appeared and now they were being chased, catching up with Max and now hurrying up a stairway looking for another way to catch Alex.

"Hey, guys…" The Cowardly Lion came strolling into the unguarded courtyard. "Did you know there was a road? I landed into a nice thicket of moss." He chuckled happily at his ability to survive his fall, looked around and glanced down an open archway leading down into the castle catacombs. "Where are you guys?"

Alex pushed open a door that smacked into the Cowardly Lion, pushing him down the staircase into the castle catacombs underneath. Listening to him howling and screaming down the stairs, she looked once at him then round the main hall. Now, she could escape, but then she hard her own guards rushing and looking for Justin, Harper and Max. Cursing out loud, she ran away from her choice of freedom, taking a route back upstairs into the tower, through a gated passageway and up to the castle parapets. Up top, she ran into Harper and her brothers again.

"Alex!!!" Justin tried to grab her, but she elbowed him to his straw chest and nearly broke him in half at the waist. She turned and ran up the stairs of another tower trying to head down. Hurriedly tucking his shirt to his pants, he watched Harper take a bucket of water from an alcove and race after her.

"Justin, I got a question..." Max clanked up to his brother. "If Alex is afraid of water, why are there so many buckets of water around for us to destroy her?"

"Because the movie is trying to help us stick to the script!!!" Justin found another pail of water in a small room. "After her!"

The clamber and noise of guards closing in were surrounding the ways down into the castle. Alex skidded to a stop to see them coming up another way. She raced out another doorway to a familiar location in the movie. It was the tower on the roof where the witch finally caught Dorothy and her friends, only now; it was where Justin and Max were catching up with her to end the movie. There was a door near her and guards rushing to catch up behind her. Alex darted toward the door then raised her broom. Why was she running when she could fly?!

"Back!!!" Alex waved her broom at Justin, Max and Harper with the buckets of water. "Back, I say!!!" She gritted her teeth defiant against getting wet. "I am not getting doused and melted in this movie! The four of us are going to Emerald City and getting the hell out of this movie!"

"Alex!" Harper stared at her ready to splash her best friend. "That's not how the movie ends!"

"Don't care!!!" Alex was backing from them along the balcony of the tower. "There is no way I'm getting killed in this movie!!!"

"Hey guys!!!" The Cowardly Lion threw the door open behind Alex, knocking her over as she stumbled backward and over the edge of the balcony. "Wait up for me!!!" He heard the sound of screaming and looked behind him. It was just for a second, but he noticed Alex going over the ledge, her pilgrimess boots vanishing over the top and then the sight of Alex falling… falling… falling… Justin looked over just in time to see Alex bounce off a crevasse and then fly back up into the air and into the ravine below into violently rushing waters cutting the canyon floor.

"You know..." Justin turned to Max and Harper. "I have seen this movie seventeen times, but… I never knew there was a river down there!"


	6. Chapter 6

6

The second Alex hit the water, she bounced out of the movie and hit the carpet at home. Getting melted didn't hurt at all, but bouncing off the cliff did. Covered in aches and pains, her parents rushed to help her off the floor before the TV. They said watching her in the movie was just like seeing her in a school play. They enjoyed it very much, but they were sorry she got hurt. Jerry wasn't upset that Justin had kept his new spell a secret.

"I slept great." Justin woke the next morning back in a body of skin, muscle, bone and tissue. "You know, I think being the Scarecrow gave me a great cardiovascular work-out!" He flexed his arm. "Do I look buff? I think I'm buff."

"I'm glad you had a great time." Max sat in his regular stool eating his cereal for breakfast. "Last night, I didn't get any sleep because I was still squeaking and creaking all night!"

"Max…" Theresa looked to her son. "You've got a metal box springs on your bed!!!"

"I know!" Max reacted. "It kept me up all night!!!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah…" Jerry was sipping his coffee ready to start getting the shop ready to open at ten in the morning. "Justin, I revealed your spell to the Wizard Council…"

"Did they like it?"

"Well…" Jerry sipped his coffee and proudly put his arm around his son. "You see, son, not a lot of wizards watch movies on DVD or VHS, so they don't know what to do with it, but they are publishing it in the next grimoire of new spells and placing it on a trial basis. So, who knows…"

"And in the mean time…"

"You won't see a dime off it."

"Not a dime…" Justin realized.

"In the meantime," Jerry reached over and picked up a DVD from the shelf. "I figured out where to go for our next vacation! Look, _National Lampoon's Vacation_!" He was grinning ear-to-ear. With his son's movie spell, he could take the family anywhere! Max and Justin looked at each other with embarrassed shock.

"Jerry," Theresa walked over to their DVD collection. "What are you crazy? The dog relieves itself on the picnic basket in that!" She pulled a movie. "Here's something romantic for us, _Romeo And Juliet_!"

"How about something the whole family will enjoy." Jerry looked again. "Oooo, _The Brady Bunch Movie_!!!"

Justin and Max started unhappily shaking their heads.

"Jerry," Theresa had another one. "_Moulin Rouge_! Nicole Kidman, Ewan McGregor…"

"Here's one!" Jerry pulled one out from the back of the shelf. "_The Blair Witch Project_! _The Blair Witch Project_? What am I crazy?" He chucked it back then headed over to check their DVDS stacked on the TV. "Let's see, we got _National Treasure_, _JFK_, _Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang_… Wait a second," Jerry checked the VCR-DVD player. "There's already a movie going. Is someone watching this?"

"What movie is it?" Justin looked over the back of the sofa. "Oh, that's _Superman Returns_ with Kevin Spacey and Brandon Routh. I saw Alex with that one last night before bed."

"You saw, Alex with it?" Max responded curiously with his juice in his hand. Parents and brothers stepped backward and watched the movie as Kevin Spacey playing Lex Luthor placed a Kryptonian crystal in a cylinder of Kryptonite and inserted it together within the body of a missile. Kal Penn was his henchman, and Parker Posey was his girlfriend. The missile was placed into a cannon aimed precisely for a fault-line under the sea around them. The music started building as the cannon went off, the missile going off with a line of white smoke just before something dashed into the scene, caught it and started soaring into the air with it.

"She can't do that!" Spacey was yelling as Luthor. "She can't do that! I want my missile back!"

"Who's she???!" Jerry asked the TV.

"That ain't Brandon Routh!" Max noticed.

On the TV screen, Alex was soaring through the atmosphere clad in a red, blue and yellow bodysuit pushing the missile into orbit. Her long dark hair was waving around her head, her big red cape snapping in the breeze. A Kryptonian symbol across her chest, she was grinning ear-to-ear excitedly, listening to the music soundtrack resonating in the sky around her, feeding her incredible ego as she exhibited incredible superhuman strength and the ability to fly. As she reached the top atmosphere, she pushed off the missile and kicked it off into orbit, destroying Luthor's insidious plan before it started!

"This is so much fun than playing Lois Lane!!!" She felt great! She had never had such powers like this! "Now, for a date with that cute Jimmy Olsen!" She dived back toward the planet, a sonic boom resonating behind her as she soared through the atmosphere, the movie soundtrack playing as she ripped through the air...

END


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